A. Lange & Sohne

A. Lange & Sohne was first established in 1845 in Glashutte, Germany by Ferdinand Adolph Lange. Ferdinand Lange started his apprenticeship in his mid teens and completed it in 1935 with honors. It was under his apprenticeship that he gained the expertise to match his pure passion for watch making. Lange was so skilled that he completely threw out the old complicated Parisian system of lignes and replaced it with the metric system. He also introduced the millimeter as the primary unit of measurement in watch making. To say A. Lange single handedly altered the history of the watch industry would be an understatement.

Adolph Lange died suddenly and his two sons Richard and Emil took over the running of the company which led to the new branding of A. Lange & Sohne in 1868. Under their direction the company began to produce an amazing array of quality pocket watches. Both World War I and II brought enormous growth to the company; German airman especially relied on A. Lange & Sohne’s pocket watches during the Second World War.

Amazingly in 1948 the post-war Soviet administration took over the company’s property, effectively ending the Lange brand. In 1990 Walter Lange the great-grandson of the founder, restored the company after the collapse of the East German government. Today Lange & Sohne has reestablished its reputation as one of the finest watch makers in the world. A. Lange & Sohne only produces watches made of precious metals and develops all of the movements used in their watches in house. Another one of the company’s notable innovations was the double split chronograph, which allows two events to be timed simultaneously up to 30 minutes each.